This invention relates in general to the field of health care, and in particular to home health care systems and methods.
Patient health care costs are escalating exponentially while the population under care is living longer. Home health care often relies on nurses who are in short supply. Home nursing care is often limited to part-time care, since nursing costs have escalated along with other health care costs.
Many elderly, infirm, disabled or other individuals requiring health care do not wish to leave their home environment, but concern of family members often results in institutionalizing patients to provide health care. One reason is that medication compliance (i.e., adherence to prescribed medication schedules) of the elderly is only about 45%, with a cost of noncompliance of $4 billion per year, according to R. P. Kusserow, Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services in Jan., 1989. It is estimated that 25% of present hospitalization of the elderly is due to under medication problems.
Patients are often forced to go to nursing homes or seek some other sort of supervision at great expense, even when their health care needs are relatively simple and routine. Among other worries, family members and health care professionals are concerned about patient forgetfulness (e.g., not remembering to take medication), confusion (e.g., taking an incorrect dosage of medication), wellness monitoring (e.g., making sure the patient has not become incapacitated), and ability to summon help (e.g., sending an alarm in an emergency).
Some home health care units have been proposed to provide apparatus for testing patient temperature or blood pressure, perhaps in combination with a medication scheduling and dispensing apparatus. There are, however, a host of other needs which it would be desirable to meet using a home health support unit. What is desirable is a practical, economical method and apparatus for home health care, which provides in addition to a 24 hour per day medication reminder and controller, speech recognition capability, verification of medication and delivery, remote data accumulation and reporting capability, wellness checking, and an emergency alarm system.